"Jeff Liebermann" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 7 Jul 2008 17:26:18 -0700, "William Sommerwerck"
wrote:

Sigh. Apparently this teacher has never built anything. One does not
build a kit to learn something. One builds it to have something that
works. The learning is incidental.

One of the ways one learns is by repeating other people's work. True
creativity grows out of mastering the fundamentals.

Of course. That's makes good sense for an academic or scientifically
inclined High Skool student. However, we're talking about a 4th grade
class of 9-10 year olds. As I previously ranted, everything they do
is a new and educational experience. The trick is to get them to do
things. Education is incidental to experience. If they happen to learn
a few things along the way, all the better.

Actually, it makes good sense for anyone. One might argue that doing things
_is_ the education. I recently saw a quote from Picasso, in which he said he
does things he doesn't know how to do in order to learn how to do them.
Children need to be taught that one way you learn is by experimenting. You
try different things to see what works. (I'm currently editing a manual at
Microsoft Hardware. I can't visualize how parts of it should be organized,
so I'm playing with different arrangements to see which work best.)

When LEGO introduced the original MindStorms, I bought a set and wrote an
extended critique, which the US division promised to review and comment on,
but (of course) never did. I'm still ****ed. (I might dig it up and post it.
I'd like to see the opinions of those in this group.)

One of the original MindStorm's problems was that it provided little, if
any, provision for copying existing designs. The view seemed to be that
kids' creativity would be stunted if they were shown how to do things. (I
never heard anyone make that complaint about Erector sets, which came with
books full of projects.) The nxt version has more designs to copy.


You might be amused with the acceptable vocabulary for a 10 year old.
As I recall from teacher prep the acceptable vocabulary was about
4,000 words (root words or lemmas) for the 4th grade. High Skool
graduates can usually manage about 17,000 words. Much of the
"fundamentals" consists of attaching names to concepts and
experiences. If you've ever had to limit your vocabulary to that of a
10 year old, you'll find the experience rather ummm... frustrating.

W doesn't seem to find it a problem.